Two Brothers by Linda Lael Miller Read Free Book Online Page A

I fell down the stairs. You say different, and I’ll swear on the preacher’s prayer book that you’re a liar.”
    “Surely you don’t mean to go back to that place?”
    “Where else would I go?”
    Aislinn flung out her hands in frustration and nearlyoverset the lantern. “I don’t know. I could speak to Eugenie—somebody runs off to get married at least once a month, and they always need help—”
    “You really are addlepated,” Liza Sue scoffed, but her tones were hollow and her smeared eyes were enormous with a yearning she couldn’t quite hide. “I step foot over the threshold of that place and they’ll toss me right out again, quick as they would that old dog by the back step. Quicker, probably.”
    Aislinn considered the dilemma. Liza Sue had certainly strayed from the fold, but she was well spoken and obviously intelligent. “Do you have any other clothes? If we scrubbed that stuff off your face—”
    “We’d never fool anybody.”
    “I can’t solve the whole problem myself, you know,” Aislinn pointed out. “For my part, I don’t see where you’ve got a whole lot to lose.”
    “You’d lie for me? Why?”
    “I wouldn’t be lying, you would.”
    Liza Sue giggled tentatively. “It won’t work. I’ve got these bruises, and somebody’s sure to remember me from the Yellow Garter.”
    “There are a lot of ways to get hurt—you said as much yourself. And if someone recognizes you, well, it seems unlikely to me that they’d want to admit to frequenting the saloon, not in respectable surroundings like the hotel dining room, anyway.”
    The other woman was silent for a few moments. “I don’t have any clothes. Jake Kingston took them away from me when I signed on at the Yellow Garter.”
    “Then I’ll give you one of my dresses. I have two to spare.” Another silence. The brindle dog came around the corner and tried to lick Aislinn’s face. She pushed him away in a distracted motion of one hand.
    “Why would you want to do this?” Liza Sue asked. “When those hotel folks find out, they’ll send you packing, right along with me.”
    “That’s probably true,” Aislinn confessed. “But I’ve got somewhere to go.” She was thinking of the homestead, with its sagging roof, broken windows and overgrown vegetable patch. She almost had somewhere to go, and in another month, if she scrimped, she’d finally have the funds to send for her brothers.
    “Pardon me, but that doesn’t answer my question.”
    Aislinn sighed. “I’m not sure,” she said. “It’s not that I’m particularly noble or anything like that …”
    “I didn’t say you were.”
    “I can’t leave you like this, Liza Sue. My conscience will chew me up alive if I do.” Aislinn stood, resigned to her duty. “If you don’t come with me, I swear I’ll go and report this whole incident to the marshal. You can say I’m lying, but it will be your word against mine.”
    “Hellfire and spit,” Liza Sue muttered, getting up. “You just don’t listen, do you?”
    “Come on. You can hide in the pantry while I go upstairs and find you something to wear. We’ll stuff those clothes into the stove and burn them.”
    “You won’t either,” came the protest, but Liza Sue tottered along behind as Aislinn led the way toward the back door. Mercifully, no one had bolted it.
    “Hush, now,” Aislinn warned, as they crept inside. Every board in the kitchen floor seemed to creak as they crossed the room, but soon Liza Sue was safely tucked away in the pantry, with the smoky stump of a tallow candle for light. She looked small and fearful in the gloom, like a bit of colored paper crumpled up and discarded.
    “You’ll come back, won’t you? You won’t forget I’m here?”
    “I won’t forget,” Aislinn assured her. “Just be quiet.”
    She was halfway up the rear stairs, the lantern in one hand, when Eugenie appeared on the landing with a lamp of her own. “Aislinn? What’s the matter? You feelin’